April 25, 2016 - Lord Of The Flies

                                                            Courtney's Previous Zone

Hey everyone! 

We had kind of a slow week this week with lots of random things happening that sometimes stopped us from being able to work, like my companion getting sick, or the secretaries calling us to say we had to move the next day to our new apartment and things like that. But hey we moved! I am an expert mover. My motto was like dad: ´´if we haven’t used it in the last 4 weeks, throw it out!´´ Sister Estela is more like mom: “but what if we´ll need it one time in the next few years...´´ haha. But our new apartment is actually in our own area and had a hot shower for one day but then broke... oh the wonders of mission. 

I’ve gotten frustrated with our tactics of meeting people just by talking to everyone on the street, it’s not very effective and you don’t meet people super interested. So we´re gearing our efforts to work with the members to teach their friends and family. It’s a slower process but you get better quality results. We met the sister of a man in our ward and her family, Sandra, Cisero and Mateus their 10 yr old son. And let me tell you that little kid is one spiritual guru. He had SO many questions for us about religion, like why Catholics have a certain prayer different than ours or why some people think Mary is a saint and some don’t and why there are so many churches. He told us ´´I worry myself sometimes so tell me this; when Jesus comes back, what’s it gonna be like? Sometimes Satan tempts me to do bad things but I usually don’t do bad things but sometimes I do...´´ lol! We´ll get to tell him the answers to all those questions this week!

The other funny thing working with members is that we´ll be talking to them about missionary work or walking around in a neighborhood and they ALL say ´´yeah there are a ton of less actives that live here! You guys should go visit them sometime!´´ and I just want to bean all of them on the head, because they all think it’s only the work of the sisters! I just think ´´you guys all know where they live, what their problem is, what their background is, and we´d have to search around to find out all of that when you guys could just go visit them on your own!´´ but hey we all have our own difficulties in life.

I think a lot about how my family being strong in the gospel, how I was born and raised in the truth, and knowledge that I have has influenced me. It is very very rare to have such a firm family where everyone is active in the church here in this area of Brasil. Very rare! I think of how much Heavenly Father has put every single little detail of my life in order so that I could make it to this point in my life and testimony, and be here sharing these truths that have changed my family’s life with other families.  I love my family so much! Thank you for being wonderful examples of diligence and faith to me! Talk to you soon!

Sister Walker

April 18, 2016 - Another One In Good Ole Arapiraca

                                                          Marcos Getting Baptized!!
                                                      With Courtney and Sister Estela

Sister Estela and I are staying together here in Arapiraca wooohooo!! Maybe this transfer will finally be a semi--normal one.... 

We had an AMAZING week, even though it was crazy when I was traveling to different cities to go on splits with other sisters. I also may or may not have gotten lost in Maceio for a few short hours because I got on the wrong bus. But as usual the Lord provides a way to help you out! 

But we had a great week because first of all, a friend of Wendel, our recent convert, has been coming to church and seminary for a few weeks and we´ve been teaching him. And he got baptized on Saturday!! It was so great. He’s 16 and a wonderful kid, very responsible and really dedicated to God. I asked him in one of our lessons why he wanted to be baptized, and he said ´´I want to be part of the kingdom of God here on earth´´. That was a pretty good answer for me! I’m really grateful for lessons like those that remind me why I came out here, to find people like him and clear up all of the blank spots that he had his whole life. 

We also are teaching an amazing 14 yr old girl named Laiza (i promise we´re not just teaching kids and baptizing them against their will). She reminds me a lot of Julia in how she is just friendly and inclusive. But she is sooo smart holy cow, she asked us when we taught the restoration who the 12 apostles were that Joseph Smith called when he reorganized the church... I was like yeah ill have to get back to you on that one... 

It’s also funny when you find out why your area got switched to sisters instead of elders when all the members talk about all the rule breaking they did... haha. They’ll say ´´how come you guys don’t hang out at our house?? Elder so and so were here every day for 3 hours!!´´ Or the women sometimes say ´´sister if you need to, you can use my phone to talk to your friends and family on facebook, the elders always needed to when they came here´´. So that goes to show you that the phrase ´´no one will ever find out´´ is sadly untrue! And I will be chatting with those elders soon enough...

But really I’m doing really good here, some of the fun elders will be transferred from my zone this transfer but I’m sure we´ll make it fun either way. I was studying this week about the talk that Syd sent me, and it talks about how we need to have faith and hope for good things to come. That when the scriptures talk about how we need to ´´be not afraid´´ or ´´be still´´, and how it is only someone who truly has passed through all of the darkness and sickness and pain and trouble that we feel that knows the right counsel to give us-to be hopeful! So that is my message for the week, that if we have the gospel, we always have reasons to be hopeful. And it is not despite but exactly because of our trials that we come to understand the grandness of the life of the savior and the power he promises for each one of us if we are willing to reach out our hand. How great is this gospel! I love being a missionary and I love you guys! Thank you for your wonderful examples and support! 

Sister Walker

April 11, 2016 - "It's The Mormons!" "There's No One Home"

                                        Wendel's Baptism (he's the shorter one in the middle)
                                                  Courtney and Sister Estella on the left

Hey Guys! 

Yes once again that subject is a real life quote from the mission field. I had the funniest/most stereotypical mission experience this week as we went to contact a reference from a member. We knocked on the door, and instead of answering, they just yelled from the other side: ´´Who is it?!´´ And I said ´´The missionaries!´´ ´´The who??´´ ´´The Mormons!´´ ´´There’s no one home right now´´ .... To which I responded ´´That’s strange, then who am I talking to?´´ haha. Sometimes you just gotta make the best of the funny reactions people have to you.

This week was wonderful! Well not super easy but our work finally paid off with the baptism of our friend Wendel!! woohooo! It was so great to see him so happy. He is already doing lots of missionary work, bringing all his friends to church! Now we´re preparing for the baptism of one of his friends, Marcos, this Saturday if everything goes as planned. Wendel will be a great elder someday! He told his friend on Sunday after he got the Holy Ghost ´´Man, I really felt something special, there’s something different about me now. And you’re gonna feel it too!´´ He’s a great kid. 

Our work is really starting to go well now. We have a good teaching group. I was wondering how it had change so quickly and realized that all of our investigators have a friend that’s a member! THAT is the secret to missionary work people. We are teaching really great, actually interested people who know a little somethin somethin about the church because the people that LIVE here actually know the people that are ready!! Missionary work shouldn’t have to be knocking on doors or chasing people down on the street that try to avoid talking to you!!

And we had interviews with Presidente Gomes this week, which I was super nervous for but turns out Presidente actually likes me and trusts me! Who knew? He told Sister Estella I’m a great missionary with a special light that guides the other missionaries #makinmomproud

One night we were planning at the end of the day and then we hear someone clapping at the door (like knocking on the door), and it was our ZLs... Turns out they were just hungry and had stopped to beg for food because they knew we´d have some haha. But hey missionaries gotta stick together!

My address here is Av. Dom Joao Sexto 122 A, Bairro Capiata, Arapiraca Alagoas so dad can look me up on google maps.

I just love being a missionary. I don’t think there is anything else more worthwhile that you could do with your life at this age than to learn how to painfully and slowly and sometimes grudgingly mold your life to be more Christlike. And then you turn around in the end and understand why the Lord wanted you to go through a trial, because you turned out better in the end! There’s a great video on the church website called ´´I’ll go where you want me to go´´ with a family who all does service throughout their day, if you get a chance to watch it, it is wonderful! All the families here love it. Well that’s all for now folks, I love you so much! Have a great week!

Sister Walker

April 4, 2016 - And Then There Were Two

                                                    Courtney, Sister Estela & Sister Mira

Hey Guys! 

How was conference weekend? Who else thinks that the world is going to suffer a very life changing world war or natural disaster or something of the kind after all that? I sure do. Conference was amazing as expected, but I couldn’t help feel that the atmosphere of the whole thing was very different than any conference in my life. I’m not sure how to explain it, something sort of unnerving and looming in the air and all the talks. It wasn’t as much about the atonement and hope and strength, it was very logistical and rational, pretty much telling everyone to repent right now because the second coming is nigh. At least that was my take on it. But it was great, and I understood the whole thing!! We watched in the chapel. And you best believe everyone went NUTS when they announced a temple in Belem!! It’ll be amazing. I swear they need to put a second church headquarters in Sao Paulo, they are really needing it with all the members and church growth here. 

But I really loved the talks by Bonnie Oscarson and President Uchtdorf. When Elder Arnold spoke all of the missionaries I was sitting by started freaking out, because it was him who came to talk to us all if you remember. We were all secretly hoping he would give a shoutout to the Brasil Maceio mission haha. Didn’t pan out. At one point the Portuguese translation cut out and it was just English so I started translating for the people sitting next to me... the next session a woman in the ward came to sit by us because ´´if the Portuguese cuts out again, I want you to tell me what’s going on!´´ 

But in other news, we got a sad phone call this week that Sister Mira would be emergency transferred the next day, because another sister had to go home for health reasons. It was pretty much just a huge shock. Tears were shed and suitcases were packed frantically. It was sad for Sister Estela and I because we don’t know the area very well, and sad for Sister Mira because she’s going home in 2 weeks now, so she’ll end in a city she doesn’t know, with members she doesn’t know. The mission teaches you to adapt quickly with whatever life throws at you. But we are doing okay in our huge area all by ourselves now like big girls, the members are great and are really willing to work with us, even if they have to take a bus for 20 minutes to get to our investigators. I sure am learning a lot of great lessons I will take with me the rest of my life! Missions are great. So grateful to be here and to have a companion I love and getting to see them grow little by little in their faith. Have a great week! 

Love you so much!

Sister Walker

March 28, 2016 - Feliz Páscoa!

Hey guys hope you had a great Easter Sunday! I even cracked open my little stash of peanut butter because it was a special occasion.

I’ve been studying like crazy the conference talks from the last conference, prepping for this upcoming one. But the hard thing is I only have them in English, the Ensign that mom sent me, and so it really messes my brain up when I study them in English in personal study and then try to explain them in Portuguese and use them throughout the day... haha English is getting hard. We´re in for a treat at mother’s day...

But this week we worked a lot with our investigator named Wendel. He’s a 17 yr old boy who has been going to church for a month now but hasn’t been baptized because his mom didn’t want him to. She heard from her neighbors that Mormon was a cult and scary, and if you got baptized and then wanted to leave afterwards they’d kill you. We went there to talk with her and told her we are not that organized and are not an Italian mob. Then she said he could be baptized! We had a great lesson with him about some of the commandments, like law of chastity and word of wisdom. And it was a tender moment when I saw how he changed when he discovered that things he had been doing in the past were wrong, and had brought sadness to heavenly father. I could explain to him how we can be completely clean of our sins through the atonement, how it cures us and what was cured stays cured. 

I was thinking about all the people out there that don’t know that god has commandments to keep us safe, all the people out there that if they knew that god has a true church on the earth, if they knew he has protections for them, we would have so many people feel that true repentance and sadness that sin brings, and would want to change. But they just don’t know it yet! That’s why we can’t choose who we share the gospel with, Christ didn’t just suffer for the members of the church, but every single person we see on the street! They too deserve the gospel. But unfortunately for Wendel there were some other complications we found out about so he´ll have to wait a little bit to be baptized but it’ll happen!

This coming week we´re hoping to move houses too, our house right now is..... quaint.... to sum it up haha. But hopefully we´ll get the elders to help us out and we´ll get our nice new apartment all in order!

I hope you all have a great conference weekend- just think of how great it is to know we have a living prophet today on the earth! Something that so many churches are lacking, someone who gives us modern and real revelation. All the things that those people will say, will be like if god himself was talking to us and guiding us. How grateful I am for the words of the prophet! I love you guys and have a great week!

Sister Walker

March 21, 2016 - Ahhr-uhh-peer-ahh-ca

                                                                 "I Love This Book!!"

First week in the new area down and I am loving it!! Arapiraca is great. We have a HUGE area, super big with lots of neighborhoods to remember. The ward is pretty small for a ward, Itabaina and Estancia had more people in sacrament than here and they’re branches! But the members are great here. The one problem is that most of the members live super far away, super super far. So most of our references are there, but Presidente doesn’t like us  working so far away from the chapel because its hard for the people to get to church, unless they have a car. Arapiraac is a real city with a real downtown and everything!! It’s so different from the interior cities I was in. But the funny part is that the houses here don’t have a real number system. Like you can be looking for a house #500 and the numbers are going up from 400 and then randomly it’ll switch to 700 and then go back down later if you’re lucky. Its quite the adventure. One day we were all making fun of each other and they said ´´I don’t  know how you ended up being born in the United States because you are Brasilian!!´´ hhaha. I get the fun job of changing every Brasilian’s view of what merica really is. *Jared voice* Challenge accepted.

Sister Mira is my companion as well as Sister Estella now! We got a surprise trio this week and now we´re 3 STLs together. Sister Mira is crazy and from Mina Gerais but I like her and Sister Estella has 1 year on the mission and is from Sao Paulo and is so sassy and a similar version of Sister Barbosa so I’m happy. I’m learning quite a few things on how to be sassy in Portuguese now... We have a lot of fun together. Also our new district and zone is super great, I love the sisters and elders so far. Another funny thing, we live next door to our DLs! haha. So if we run out of soap or water or food we just go borrow it from them. One night they even shared the pizza they had ordered with us!! I am living in heaven.

Also in this ward its fun because they have an English class here for the members, because there always seems to be one American missionary here at a time. So this week I got to teach! 

Also I found out that this week is gonna be EASTER. Wow how am I so disconnected from the world? And I was thinking about the sacrifice of the savior, and not just what it means, but the question that lots of our investigators have, which is ´´now that we know this, what now?´´. I was thinking and I felt like I should share with you my feelings about it. So I want you to know that He is the reason that I came here on my mission. It wasn’t because of my goodly parents or siblings or friends, but I came here because I love my savior, and I know personally of the peace and transformation that can happen in our lives because of Him. I’m here because other people need to be able to receive those things for themselves so they can have the chance to choose or not if they’re willing to follow our savior! His sacrifice was not for the elect or the chosen, but for all. So ALL of us here deserve a chance to hear it, we all deserve the blessings of the gospel. I know our savior lives. He gave his life up on the cross but didn’t stay there- He lives! And because he lives we have the chance to be perfected, to be clean and be renewed every single day. I love this gospel and I love being a missionary! Don’t let this week go by without letting someone know how much Christ loves them as well! I love you guys so much feliz páscoa!!

Sister Walker  

March 14, 2016 - Peace Out Cub Scout!

                                  "Come Unto Me And I Shall Make You Fishers Before Men"

                                                                 So Long Estancia!!!

Transfers have occurred people. Wake up and smell the roses!!

I am being transferred to Arapiraca, 2nd ward. I’m going to serve in a ward people!! It’s in Alagoas so I’ll get to cross the border to the other state and even be close to Maceio! All I know about my area is that most everyone loves it that goes there, but the water system is really bad so you can be without water in your house for a week at a time, every other week... haha. Adventure is out there!! I’ll be companions with a Sister Mira, who is from Sao Paulo and I already like the few times I’ve talked to her. This will be her last transfer before she goes home! Sister Barbosa is going to the same city as me, but a different area. We´ll still get to be in the same zone woohooo!! I think this change will be really good for the both of us. A little fresh air and a new perspective and new people. 

Here it is just heating up more and more. It’s funny to me when the people who actually live here their whole lives complain about how hot it is here... I’m like wait didn’t you choose to live here? But they’re all saying that this summer is the hottest one they’ve had. I have great luck. This week here in Brasil they celebrated ´´womens day´´ which was like the greatest thing ever if you ask me, a whole day just to celebrate being a girl. We got to talk all day long about the value of being a woman in the eyes of god and how much he trusts and confides in us to fulfill his work here on earth. #girlpower

Also this week we had a really cool experience with one of our less actives we´ve been working with named Patricia. She’s a 26 yr old woman with a 2 yr old son, who is separating from her husband currently. We went there just to invite her to church but she invited us in and after a few questions her whole life story came crumbling out. She told us of all her trials and the horrible things that are going on in her marriage that she’s trying to get away from. Luckily we had planned to talk about the atonement with her - isn’t it great how god helps you plan those things out? And we got to testify to her that the gospel of Christ is second chances, it is totally and completely for her in this moment. It’s to make the bad people good and the good people better. That Christ doesn’t see her as damaged goods but as she searches for him  and puts him first in her life, he will do the same for her. Its so amazing to see how one little visit, one message about the love of the savior can just change someone’s perspective on everything. she even came to church on Sunday!

I’ve also been thinking a lot about why I was called to serve in Brasil, when I felt it was hard to establish myself, to get the language down and feel like I was useful in missionary work. But I realized after thinking a lot that I’m in Brasil to learn how to be humble, to learn how to truly value the gospel and not let it become something mundane and common. Because I was forced to relearn a lot of things, and in doing that I’ve found a new love for the basics of the gospel, for faith and repentance and how those things really change our lives. I am very grateful I get to be here and meet these people that are often times serving me much more than I’m serving them. 

I’ll talk to you guys with new news from Arapiraca next week! Love you so much! Help the sisters out this week!

Sister Walker